Ponyboy gets a licking
by WindyWriter
Summary: The title pretty much describes the first chapter and the third. Rated for a spanking and language. Updated Aug 9 2006 I was inspired for some reason. Completed on Aug. 13.
1. Chapter 1

OK, so remember in the book where the big deal is that Darry never hit Pony? What if that wasn't the case. I was thinking about that, then I read the part in Tex where he's thinking how Jamie gets spanked or grounded once a week, and this came to me. I wrote it and last week found this site and joined just to post. I think I'm supposed to tell you I didn't make up Pony boy or those guys, just the idea.

**Pony gets a spanking**

Ponyboy's POV

I sat on the bench in the lobby of the police station, chewing on my fingernails while Darry talked to the cop. When the cruisers pulled in at school, for a minute I was glad – tuff enough, I figured, but I didn't feel so tuff now. I wasn't arrested, but the fight was bad enough that the cops wanted to talk to my guardian before they'd let me go.

Darry came back to me and hauled me to my feet, not looking at me at all. I'd never seen him so mad. Glory, I was going to be grounded until I was 16.

But Darry had other plans. When we got into the truck, he said, "You are never going to do this again. When we get home, we are going to discuss this, and when we're done, you won't be sitting down for a week."

My stomach plummeted. He couldn't be serious. I was 14 years old. Not only was I way too old for a licking, no one in my family had ever spanked me. None of us had ever been spanked, as far as I could remember.

Darry didn't say another word the whole ride home. When we pulled up in front of the house, he got out of the truck and walked quickly to my side, opening my door like I was his date and he was being a gentleman. The look on his face, however, told me there was going to be nothing gentle about this.

I said the only thing I could think of. "Soda won't let you."

"Soda ain't here," Darry said, pulling me out. "And it wouldn't matter if he was."

He pushed me in front of him, with a hard hand in the middle of my back, into house and down the hall toward his room, the room that used to be Mom and Dad's.

"You ain't doing this, Ponyboy," he said when we were in the room with the door closed. "You ain't. You ain't getting arrested and running wild and giving the state any reason to stick you in a boys' home. They'd send Soda too, and he hasn't done anything." He looked me dead in the eye. "I fuss at you a lot about college, but that's your choice. I hope you go, but it's up to you. But you are going to graduate high school and you are going to stay out of trouble and you are going to act like a decent human being. Do I make myself clear?"

I nodded. I wasn't even trying to get out of the punishment, not yet. He was right, and I knew it.

"And Johnny. That it was Johnny makes it worse, do you understand that?"

I nodded again.

"All right then." Darry put his foot on the edge of the bed rail. "Come over here."

"Darry, no, come on, you can't really mean to –"

"I can and I will," he said "Don't make me come get you. I have no patience right now and you're going to make it worse for yourself."

I made myself step forward, one foot, then the other. When I was within reach, Darry grabbed my arm and yanked me over his knee.

There was no talk about how this was going to hurt him more than it was going to hurt me, because that obviously was not the case. His hands were calloused and hard from roofing, and the first crack stung enough to make me yelp, even through the seat of my jeans. I tried to pull away but Darry was taller and stronger and he kept me firmly bent over with his left hand as his right hand came back for another swat. I had nowhere to go.

When the fourth swat landed, I started to cry. By the time he'd hit me twelve times, I was full out bawling, begging him to stop, promising to be good. He didn't answer, just kept on whacking me. It wasn't just the pain, or even the humiliation of thinking I was some tough hood and being spanked like a little kid. Through my tears, I could see a picture of Mom and Dad on Darry's dresser and I couldn't shake the feeling that they were watching, disappointed in what I was doing. I was ashamed of myself.

And then it was over. I suddenly realized I wasn't pinned down anymore and I straightened up. As soon as I did, Darry hugged me to his chest and let me cry. When my sobs started to slow down, he said softly, "Ponyboy, I don't want to make a habit of this."

"Me, neither," I choked out, my voice muffled in his shirt, and Darry let me go.

Soda missed the whole thing, and Darry didn't tell him. It wasn't until we were getting ready for bed and he caught me twisting around backward, trying to see if my butt was still red, that he realized what had happened.

"Glory, Ponyboy, he paddled you good," Soda said, inspecting the damage. "Still sore?"

"Yeah," I said. Technically, Darry hadn't paddled me – he'd used his hand. But somewhere in the house, there might be an actual paddle. There were definitely belts and wooden spoons and rulers and God knows what all, and I had no intention of pushing him this far ever again. If I was still sore hours later and I'd had my jeans on, what would happen if he decided to whomp me bare-assed? He was bigger and stronger – if he caught me, I knew he could do it.

I crawled into bed and tried to get comfortable. Sleeping on my back was out of the question.

"You must have made him awful mad," Sodapop said. "What'd you do?"

"He didn't tell you?" I wasn't itching to spread the news, but I couldn't lie to Soda. "I got hauled in by the cops. I was fighting in the school yard and when I wouldn't quit, they called the fuzz."

"Fightin' who?"

This was the hard part. "Johnny," I admitted. Johnny hadn't been picked up. The teachers all saw I'd started the fight. Good thing – if he ever got arrested his old man would make Darry's punishment look like love taps.

"**Johnny?" **Soda sat up and looked at me. "Are you an idiot? Maybe Darry is right – you sure don't use your head sometimes."

I could have started bawling right there, looking at his face all dark and disappointed. "I'm sorry."

"Johnnycake. Lord Amighty. Like he ain't got enough problems. What in the blue hell made you take a swing on Johnny?"

A girl, but I couldn't tell Soda that. But like I said, I couldn't lie to him neither, so I kept quiet, picking a spot on the wall to look at.

"If you're gonna do something stupid enough to get you hauled away from Darry, make it count," he said in disgust.

"I know. I know." Lord, I couldn't stand Soda being mad with me.

Soda reached over me and turned out the light, then tapped my backside. I winced.

"Ponyboy," he said slowly. "You ever do anything so stupid again, I'll tan you myself."

Well? Would he really? What would Pony have done? How mad would Soda have to be? Read and Review!


	2. Chapter 2

_Hey ho, thanks reviewers, I wasn't going to update because honestly I didn't know what they fought about. But I think I came up with something. "Smile because it happened" I always thought if Ponyboy made Darry pissed enough, or scared enough that something would happen to Pony, he might take a whack at him. I don't know about a series of one-shots, but maybe Darry will decide this will be the punishment he uses from now on. I dunno. And I guess Pony couldn't really make Soda belt him, but it might be interesting to see how to see how far it could be pushed. Muuuu haaa haaa! More reviews are welcome. And I still don't own any of these characters but the girls. --WW_

* * *

The next morning, I was finishing my homework at the kitchen table while Darry made breakfast. It was hard to get comfortable. The night before, we'd had pizza on the living room couch, so sitting still hadn't been so hard. And speaking of hard, were the kitchen chairs always this hard?

"Ponyboy, quit fidgeting," Darry said.

"Can't help it," I mumbled.

Soda sat next to me, his hair wet from his shower, and reached over me to get a piece of toast. "Ants in your pants?" he asked.

I shot him a look and he grinned at me. Bastard. I shifted position and tucked one leg under my still-sore backside, to see if that would help. Not really. How was I supposed to sit still in school?

"Darry."

"Hm?"

"I don't think I can go to school today."

Darry set a plate of bacon and eggs in front of me and put a hand on my forehead. "You don't feel warm."

"I'm not," I said, then mumbled, "not there."

He looked completely puzzled, then Sodapop burst out laughing.

"Good Lord, Pony, you'd think you're the only kid who ever got his butt blistered?" he asked. "Don't be such a baby."

"How would you know?" I snapped. "You didn't."

"Well, no, not by Darry, but sure I did."

"Really." He was full of it. "By who?"

Soda looked at me like I was stupid. "Dad."

"Dad?" My father was a gentle giant. He didn't even yell all that much.

"Dad," Soda confirmed.

"Our dad."

"Yes."

"Darrel Curtis Senior, our father."

"Yes," Soda said impatiently. "Did you wake up deaf and stupid?"

I still couldn't believe it. "When? I don't remember that."

"Then you weren't home."

I shook my head. I swear Soda waited on purpose until I had my mouth full of food before he said casually, "He took a strap to me once. I'd say Darry let you off easy."

I choked. "He did not."

Soda snorted. "Yeah, he did."

I couldn't imagine. "For what?"

"I made Mom cry."

Oh. I take it back. That I can imagine.

"I wanted to go somewhere with Steve, and she wouldn't let me, and I told her I hated her and called her a name," Soda said. "She started to cry. I didn't see Dad – I didn't even know he was there until he dragged me into our room and flipped me over. He took off his belt and let me have it. I hollered my head off."

I just stared at him.

"And then he made me brush my teeth with soap, because I'd called Mom such a filthy name." His face flushed. "Boy, I'd give a lot to take that back now."

I looked at Darry, who was calmly eating his eggs. "That true?"

Darry shrugged. "I didn't see it, but he paddled me a couple of times, so yeah, I suppose it's true."

I was stunned. "How come I didn't know that? How come he never hit me?"

"You're the baby," Soda said. "You were the good one. So sweet and sensitive." He rolled his eyes. "Maybe me and Darry were badder than you." He chuckled and stuck out his leg, poking his toe at my backside. "Besides, I'd say now you joined the club."

Swell.

Darry looked at me seriously. "I meant what I said yesterday. I don't want to make a habit of this. So don't give me a reason to. If the only way to get you to behave is to spank some sense into you, I will."

I didn't answer. My stomach clenched at the thought.

Darry stood up and began clearing the table. "And Pony?"

"What?"

"Make things right with Johnny."

* * *

Of course, Darry didn't let me stay home, and an hour later I was sitting in Chemistry, concentrating more on not squirming in my chair than on the chemistry lesson. Johnny hadn't been waiting on the corner for me, not that I really expected him to.

A folded piece of paper sailed over my shoulder and landed in the middle of my notebook. I made sure the teacher was turned around before I opened it.

_Angie said the cops came! What happened?_

I turned around and looked at Melanie, the reason for this whole sorry mess, even though she didn't know it. "Later," I mouthed at her.

"Mr. Curtis?"

I snapped my head back to the front.

"You and Miss Dabner have something you want to say to the class?"

"No," I mumbled. I could feel my ears turning red.

Melanie was a Soc girl, but she didn't look down her nose at us like most of them did. When we did experiments, Mel was my partner, because the teacher pairs us up in ABC order. She was real nice and she always talked to me like she was interested in what I had to say. I liked her. I liked her a whole lot. I was fixing to ask her out, and I told Johnny that, and he laughed. He told me she'd never go out with a greaser like me and she only talked to me in the first place to annoy the Soc boys. It made me mad because he might be right, and I cuffed him without thinking about it too much. He came back at me. Sometimes, his reflexes were too quick, from being hit all the time at home. And then neither one of us would quit, even though we were fighting about nothing at all, because we're both stubborn and stupid.

I walked out of class with Melanie, who was looking at me anxiously. "Did you get arrested? What happened?"

Maybe Johnny was right, but damn if she didn't seem to like me. "No, I wasn't arrested. But they called my brother."

"Was he awfully mad?" she asked.

For a brief, ridiculous second, I thought about telling her. I wondered how much sympathy I might get. I even wondered if I could get her to look. Then I thought about how it felt when I was bent in half howling for mercy, and I just shrugged and walked her to her next class.

Three periods later, I finally ran into Johnny on the way to lunch. I jogged down the hall to catch up with him. "Hey."

He ignored me for a minute, then said softly, "Hey."

We walked along for a minute and I finally said, "Darry whipped my ass."

Johnny snorted, then realized I was speaking literally. "Man," he said.

"I deserved it," I admitted. "Soda was pretty pissed too."

Melanie and her friend Angie walked by us. Angie pretty well ignored us, but Mel said, "Hey Pony, Hi Johnny."

"Hey," we answered.

"She's a pretty girl," Johnny said after a minute. "Maybe she'd say yes."

And then I knew we were made up.


	3. Chapter 3

_I'm back. I didn't think I would update this, but the idea came to me yesterday, so here I am. Hope you don't think this makes me a weirdo. The Outsiders belongs to SE Hinton and the plot idea kind of came from that too. This story is rated for bad words and spanking. Reviews welcome – thanks for the others._

_Wend_

**Chapter Three**

It took me two weeks to get up the nerve to ask Melanie out, and imagine my surprise when she actually said yes. I met her at the Nightly Double, but instead of staying there, we got food from the A&W and went to the park and had a picnic. She had beautiful eyes. I didn't know what she was saying half the time from staring in her eyes.

It was getting late. It was also getting chilly, so I gave her my jacket. She snuggled against me. "Stay out with me," she whispered. "Let's stay here. Let's watch the sun come up."

I should have said no. I should have told her I had to be in by twelve. I should have remembered. I should have said to myself every single day, "Darry spanked you once, and it sucked, and he might do it again, so watch your step."

But I didn't. As the sting in my backside faded, so did the memory. And even though my brothers had teased me that following morning, surely it was a one-time thing. Soda would never lay a hand on me, I was sure, and Darry … well, I'd just be careful, is all. And not even Darry's hard hand could keep me from this pretty girl.

Darry always says I don't use my head.

We were kissing when a harsh light shone in our eyes. We both jumped. Mel hid her head in my shoulder and I squinted.

"What you doin' with that girl, boy?"

It was a cop. Behind him stood five Soc boys. "See, officer," one of them said, "he just dragged her out behind here."

My jaw dropped. "I did not," I protested. "Melanie, tell them!"

But Melanie had gotten up, straightened her blouse and gone to stand next to one of the boys. "I'm sorry," she mouthed at me. I couldn't have been more surprised if she'd turned invisible. She was just like all the others.

One of the boys stepped forward and smiled at the cop. "No harm done," he said, as if he and the cop were old friends.

"I ought to haul him in," the cop said. "If he tried to rape this girl …"

Blessedly, Melanie finally opened her mouth. "No, it wasn't like that," she said. "I just want to go home."

The cop didn't want to leave, but the Socs talked him into it, saying they'd take Mel home. One of them seemed to know him, like he was a relative or something. The cop finally left and he wasn't even around the corner when them boys came at me.

"You need to stay with your own kind, grease," one of them said, backing me up against the roundabout.

"Hey!" someone shouted. "Hey!"

I was never so happy to see Dallas Winston in my life. At least it evened up the odds. At least, that's what I thought, until two of them pulled out switchblades.

In turn, Dallas pulled out his gun. No one but me knew it wasn't loaded. The Socs all backed up immediately. Melanie's face turned white. I guess I wasn't what she thought neither.

"Go get that cop," one of the boys whispered.

Dally pointed the gun in his direction. "You better not," he threatened. "Y'all best just go."

They all backed up a little more, then one of them screeched, "Help! Police! He's got a gun!"

They all took off running after the cop. Dallas grabbed my arm and we ran in the other direction. He led me through the woods and the back lots of the worst neighborhoods and we finally ended up in Buck Merrill's backyard.

Dally climbed the steps. "Come in until the fuzz cool off," he said.

"I can't go in there," I said, what little sense I had finally coming back to me. "Darry'd kill me."

Dallas actually chuckled. "Kid, Darry's gonna kill you anyway. Or don't you think that pretty little Soc is going to give up your name?"

I followed him blindly inside. I sat in the corner, chewing on my fingernails, while Dally drank beer and shot some pool and chatted up the cheap girls drunk on whisky. Hours later, he decided it was safe to venture out, and he took me home the same way we'd gotten there – sneaking through yards and over fences.

The sky was starting to get light when we climbed our front stairs. Soda came out the front door as he heard us, looking frantic. "Where have you been?" he cried. "The cops were here, they said something about an assault – were you assaulted?"

Dallas laughed. "Nope. They thought lover boy here did the assaulting." He moved his jacket to show the gun in his waistband. "We scared them boys off and I didn't let him stick around. We been at Buck's, hiding from the fuzz. I took right good care of that."

"You have got to be fucking kidding me."

Before I could register the fact that I had never, ever heard that word come out of Soda's mouth, he grabbed my arm and hauled me into the house, snarling, "Dallas, go home," over his shoulder. Dally, who looked as shocked as I was, obeyed.

When we cleared the doorway, Soda yanked me around to grab both my shoulders and gave me a hard little shake. My teeth rattled. "You're hurting me," I hissed, trying to pull away.

"What the hell were you thinking?" he shouted, and I flinched in spite of myself. I didn't like the rageful look on his face. "Don't you have a lick of sense at all?"

There seemed no right answer to that, so I kept my mouth shut. Soda kept glaring at me, and a moment later, I realized we seemed to be alone in the house. "Where's Darry?" I finally asked weakly.

"He's out lookin' for you, and he's mighty pissed," Soda said. He let me go, shoving me onto the couch. "He swore when he found you he'd take a strap to you, and I'm going to let him."

I was afraid of that. "You can't --"

"And if you don't shut up I'll do it myself," Soda said coldly. He folded his arms. "You want to get yourself hauled out of here and to a boys' home, you go ahead on. But maybe you could wait until I'm of age, if it's not too much bother, since I ain't itchin' to go anywhere, and we're kind of a package deal."

"It's not like that. I was with Melanie -- it happened so fast --" I poured out the whole story. Soda was at least looking a little sympathetic when the front door opened. Darry looked bigger somehow, which of course was impossible. He saw me sitting there and his face went from relieved to happy to furious, all in a second.

"You're all right?" he asked.

I nodded.

"Want to tell me where the hell you've been?"

I kept my mouth shut. After a minute, Soda told him the story.

Darry fixed me with a stare. "Them Socs didn't hurt you?"

"No."

"They keep you there against your will? Kidnap you, or somethin'?"

"What? No."

"Are you sure?" I expected Darry to be screaming, but his voice was quiet and tight, which was way more scary than if he'd been hollering his head off. "Because I figured you had to be tied up or halfway to dead to pull a stunt like this."

I forced myself to look at his face. "I'm sorry."

"Oh, you will be," he said evenly. "Soda?"

"Yeah?"

"Lock the door. No sense in having someone walk in and embarrass him."

With my eyes on Sodapop, I never saw him coming. He moved quickly, with the speed and agility that had made him captain of the football team in high school, pulled me up, grabbed the sides of my jeans and yanked. They were Soda's old jeans, still too big for me, and they went down easily, my underware going with them. Darry had me across his lap on the couch so fast I didn't have time to run. He pulled me tight against him with one arm around my waist and his other hand came crashing down on my naked ass.

His blows came hard and fast and there was nothing I could do. I gasped out a couple of objections but it was as if he'd gone stone deaf. I tried to put my hands back for some sort of protection but Darry just grabbed my wrists and pinned them behind me, just as easy as if he was swatting a fly. Then he kept spanking. He showed no signs of slowing down. I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't even think. He just kept swatting me and it seemed his hand got heavier and heavier. I was determined I wasn't going to cry like the last time. It hurt worse than anything, somehow it hurt worse than getting beat up in a rumble, but I wouldn't yell. The only noise was his hand coming down and the little gasps I couldn't stop.

After what seemed like hours later, he stopped. I'd managed to keep pretty quiet, but my jaw ached from clenching my teeth and I'd kicked my jeans and briefs clear off my legs in protest. He laid his hand on my back, rubbing for a minute as I caught my breath, then said quietly, "Sodapop?"

"What?"

Soda was still there? I wanted to die from pain and shame and embarrassment.

"I need you to go into my room and get me Dad's strap. It's hanging in the back of my closet."

"No!" I began struggling anew. The movement took Darry by surprise and for a moment I thought I might get away, but he tightened his hold on me and cracked me again to make me stop.

I felt a gentle hand on my shoulder and I knew it was Sodapop. "Darry," he said quietly, "you tanned him right red. Maybe that's enough."

"I want him to remember this."

"He will."

I felt Darry hesitate, then he said, "What would Dad have done to him? To either of us? Hell, even _Mom_ would have whipped him silly for this, and you know it."

A moment later, I heard Soda walk out of the room. Traitor, I thought bitterly. My ass was burning and throbbing. I tried to pull away once more, then gave up. "I hate you," I hissed.

"Hate me all you want," Darry said. "But you ain't goin' to jail or a boys' home."

He didn't say anything else. I lifted my head and watched Soda hand Darry the strap. He wouldn't look at me. Darry folded it in half and didn't pause before bringing it down hard on top of my reddened backside. He only strapped me four times, but I couldn't be quiet anymore. I howled to wake the dead.

* * *

The pressure on my butt woke me up the next morning when I rolled over on my back. The bed was empty. I crept into the bathroom and twisted sideways to see how bad it was. It still hurt. There was a deep, dull ache, almost an itch, and I was surprised to see there was only a small pinkness to my posterior. No bruises. Not even a welt. 

I'd expected my whole bottom to be black and blue, like I'd seen Johnny's backside and legs after a beating from his father. Suddenly, I realized the difference – Johnny's father beat him. Darry spanked me. Johnny never did anything to deserve it. While I wasn't happy to have been bent over Darry's knee for the second time in a month, I had to admit I could follow his reasoning, at least. And that was why it had hurt more than a punch in the face at a rumble. I didn't give one damn about those Socs. But Darry was my big brother.

I went into the kitchen to find a piece of cake and a note on the kitchen table. My brothers were both at work. The cops had called. Melanie, I guess, had pretty much told the truth, but they wanted to talk to me anyway. And they wanted to know about Dally's gun. Darry would be home by one and then we were going down to the station.

Good God, what a mess.

With a heavy sigh, I pulled out a chair. A minute later, I was eating my cake standing at the kitchen counter. I'd never thought it was possible to really spank someone so hard they wouldn't be able to sit down. Apparently, I was wrong.


	4. Chapter 4

_For PyroJoe, here's your happy ending. And thanks for all the reviews. Maybe I'll revisit this subject someday. Ideas and reviews are welcome. W._

**Chapter Four**

I was lying my bed – on my stomach -- reading when Darry got home. He looked exhausted. I realized with a jolt that he'd probably gone roofing on no sleep at all. I'd been out almost all night.

He came and leaned in the doorway. "Speakin' to me yet?" he said in his usual blunt way.

I shrugged. He'd tried to talk to me the night before, but as soon as he let me up, I'd high-tailed it into my room, still half-naked. I curled myself around my pillow and Soda stroked my back as I cried myself to sleep. I hadn't done that since Mom and Dad died.

After a minute, I said, "We goin' to the station?"

Darry shook his head. "No need. Dally's going."

I stared at him. "Wha – what do you mean, Dally's going?"

"We went to see him, me and Soda. We convinced him to go on down and talk to the fuzz." Darry smiled grimly. "He's already got a record. You don't need one."

How about that. Even tough Dallas Winston was a little bit afraid of my big brother. I felt a little surge of pride, even though I was still mad and my backside still hurt.

Darry sat down next to me. "Ponyboy, we need to straighten some things out," he started, but I cut him off, blurting out the question that had haunted me all day.

"Is this going to be it?"

"Is what going to be what?"

"Is this how I get punished? No yelling, no grounding me, just straight to the strap?"

Darry sighed. Instead of answering me, he said, "I want to tell you a story."

"You're kidding." He really was out of his mind. Spankings, bedtime stories … like he thought I was six again.

"I want to tell you about the last time Dad gave me a licking," he said. "The first time, and the last time."

That got my interest. I rolled over on my side and looked at him.

"When I was about 15, Tim Shepard and me got hauled into the police station for lifting hubcaps," he began. "Timmy was going to sell them – I was just along for the ride. Thought it'd be cool. I wanted to see if we'd get away with it. We were cocky so of course we got caught."

"And the cops called Dad?"

Darry nodded. "And Tim's dad, too. Old man Shepard, he just laughed and took Tim home. But Dad was hoppin' mad. He talked to the cop and took me in one of those interrogation rooms. One of the cops dug up an old ping pong paddle and Dad bent me over a chair and busted my ass. He told me none of his boys were going to grow up to be common hoodlums, and if he ever had to spank me again, it'd be the sorriest day of my life."

He paused, and I finally prompted, "So was that it?"

Darry shook his head. "No. I didn't believe him. I figured he'd done it for the benefit of the cops – you know, so they'd think, 'Hey, Curtis paddled his kid, so he's been punished; we don't have to arrest him.' It was like a play. And it hurt some, sure, but I had jeans on and it wasn't horrible. It was more embarrassing than anything, and I figured it was worth being embarrassed to stay out of jail.

"So a couple weeks later, David Barton lifted a six-pack of beer and the two of us went over to the park to have a smoke and a drink instead of going to football practice."

I gaped at him. Darry, smoking? Underage drinking? The golden boy athlete, skipping practice?

"We were sitting there thinking we was a couple of real cool cats, boozing it up and smoking cancer sticks, no idea how dumb we looked, when who came walking through? Mom, on her way home with a bottle of milk from Callahan's store."

I was completely caught up in the story. "Oh, my God."

Darry winced, even now, at the memory. "The look on her face, Ponyboy … we put out the butts and hid the bottles, but she wasn't stupid. I never saw her that mad – not before and not after. She didn't say a thing. She just crooked her finger at me, and you bet I got up and followed her straight home. She sent me into her bedroom, away from you and Soda. I could hear you two playing in the backyard with Johnny and Steve. And when Dad got home …"

His face was starting to turn red and I was mortified for him. "You don't have to tell me, I get it," I said.

"No. I do have to tell you. I want you to understand." He took a deep breath. "Dad came in, I don't know how much later it was, and he knew all about it. I could tell from his face. He reminded me what he'd said in the police station and he asked me if I thought he'd been kidding. I did, but I couldn't tell him that, so I said no. 'Then you understand what we're doing here, Darry,' he said, and he went and got the strap. He had me take down my pants and my drawers and he took me over his knee like I was a little boy, and he let me have it."

Just like Darry had done to me.

Darry was playing with the corner of the blanket. "Dad was pretty strong. Once he had me over, I couldn't get loose. And once he started strapping me, I sure tried. By the time he was done, I was screeching to beat the band and begging him to stop."

I cleared my throat. "How – how many times?" I asked.

"How many licks, you mean?" When I nodded, Darry shrugged. "I don't know. I lost count around 15."

I squirmed uncomfortably.

"Then after, he just sat with me. He didn't even say anything. He helped me get my drawers up and sat with me until I calmed down. We came out and Mom had taken you and Sodapop somewhere, so we made dinner for everyone and that was that." Darry met my eyes. "I never disobeyed him again, ever. Not even after I was more than 18. Not until the day they died." He leaned over earnestly and rested one hand on my shoulder. "It wasn't because it hurt me, Pony. I'm not afraid of pain. I got tackled or in fistfight every damn day. It was because it hurt _him_. It was because I disappointed him and he thought I was better than that, so I wanted to _be_ better than that. And it was because I knew he loved me and he didn't want to lay a hand on me, but by God, I was not going to end up in jail. And if taking that strap to me was the only way to stop it, then that was what he'd do. Do you understand?"

I nodded.

"Well, that's how it is with you. You asked me if this was what we were going to do for punishment. I hope not. But if I have to strap the sense into you, I will."

"Lucky me," I mumbled.

To my surprise, Darry chuckled and ruffled my hair. "Don't feel so special. I'd do it to Sodapop, too, if I thought I had to, but he's doin' alright. You and me, though, we're the same kind of stubborn, and as I recall, that belt sure gets your attention."

Yeah. It sure did. My hand went to my backside in reflex. Darry watched me give a little wince.

"I don't like strappin' you," Darry went on. "But I'm not going to let you disgrace their memory like that."

My mouth fell open and I was startled almost into crying. I'd never thought of it like that. I had to take a deep breath before saying, "I'm sorry. You'll never have to do that again." I meant it, too, I meant it way more now than I had the night before.

"Dad was loud and clear – none of his boys were going to turn out to be common hoodlums," Darry answered. "That means not you neither, and making sure of that falls to me." He stood up and stretched. "I'm going to get in a couple of hours sleep. Leave me a note if you go somewhere. Steer clear of Dallas for a couple days."

"I ain't grounded?" As soon as I said it, I could have kicked myself. Nothing like giving the man ideas.

Darry grinned wryly. "Nah. I think you've been punished enough."

He was still asleep and I was starting to dig through the cupboards for dinner when Soda came in around five. He kicked off his shoes and threw his DX shirt in the general direction of the sofa and came into the kitchen.

"Hey."

"How was work?"

"Just work." Soda fixed himself some chocolate milk and sat at the table. "You and Darry make up?"

"Yeah, I reckon so."

Soda shook his head. "You can't disappear like that, Pony. After what happened to Mom and Dad, every time someone's late, Darry thinks they're dead and gone." He took a gulp of his drink and then said, "I do, too. You scared us to death."

"I'm sorry," I said. "I won't do it again."

"No, I guess you won't." Soda sighed. "I know y'all think you're too old to be spanked like that. And you are, I s'pose. But you're too old to be doin' stupid stuff and breakin' curfew and all that, too, dig?"

"Yeah," I said. "I dig." And I did.

Soda smiled at me, his famous movie-star grin. "I'll make dinner, it's my turn. Go on. Find a pillow to put on your chair."

He ducked under my swing and opened the fridge. For some reason, I wanted us all to be together, so I went in and woke Darry. Maybe we could stop Sodapop from making purple pork chops.

**The end**


End file.
